D-rays Play To The Crowd

AMERICAN LEAGUE

Tampa Bay Promises To Hustle, Hoping That Victories Eventually Will Be The Result.

April 3, 2002|By Josh Robbins, Sentinel Staff Writer

ST. PETERSBURG -- An inning-ending strikeout in a scoreless Major League Baseball game never brings joy to the team whose turn at bat has ended.

But maybe the third strike to Tampa Bay's Greg Vaughn to end the bottom of the first inning Tuesday night brought some pleasure to the Devil Rays' front office.

When home-plate umpire Dale Scott called strike three on Jeff Weaver's seemingly outside pitch to Vaughn, the announced crowd of 38,142 at Tropicana Field erupted with boos. Loud boos.

Hey, when your team drew an average of 16,029 fans per game last year, any crowd reaction will do. Besides, when Ben Grieve belted the Devil Rays' first hit one inning later -- a line-drive double off the base of the left-center-field wall -- those jeers turned to cheers.

The Devil Rays celebrated their opening day with a 9-5 victory against the Detroit Tigers, and the fans left the dome happy. Most likely, so did the team's brass. The upper deck, which will be closed for most games this season to create a homier atmosphere, appeared about half full. There were only a few empty seats between the foul poles in the lower deck.

Those paying customers produced cheers in the fourth when Brent Abernathy sent a run-scoring, ground-rule double to left-center to give the Devil Rays a 2-1 lead. That noise, while not a roar, approached the intensity of the ovation given to Army Gen. Tommy Franks, chief of the U.S. Central Command, when he threw out the ceremonial first pitch.

This qualified as a mild tonic for a franchise that could use a boost. Tampa Bay went 62-100 last year and has not won more than 69 games in any of its other three full seasons.

The losing is tough, even for diehard season-ticket holders such as Bill Gannon of Bradenton, who walked into the ballpark at 4:35 Tuesday afternoon to find eight Devil Rays players greeting fans.

Gannon said: "Once in a while, when we win a game, I say, `Can you imagine this? Yankee fans feel like this all the time.' "

Most baseball prognosticators predict the Devil Rays will finish in or near the American League East cellar.

"If you go into this season expecting us to win the division or anything like that, then your expectations are a little obviously too high," Grieve said. "But if you go in with the mind-set you're going to watch a young team that's going to go out there and play hard and have fun -- and that's the type of baseball you want to see -- then it's a good team to watch."

That's the message behind the team's "Heart and Hustle" marketing campaign: The Devil Rays will get their uniforms dirty, even if Tropicana Field consists mostly of artificial turf.

Most of the aging veterans who dotted Tampa Bay's roster in past years -- Wade Boggs and Jose Canseco come to mind -- are long gone. The team's lineup Tuesday night featured seven players in their 20s.

"They're certainly going to lose some games and they're going to win some games, but the facts are that they're going to give their all," said Vince Naimoli, the team's chairman.

At the end of last year, youngsters dominated Tampa Bay's lineup, and the Devil Rays went 24-23 to finish the season. The pitching staff, one of the American League's worst during the first half of the year, posted the league's fourth-best ERA from July 12 on.

The upswing instilled confidence in many of the young players. "The experience is not here, but the talent's definitely here," said Toby Hall, who was recalled from Class AAA Durham, N.C., in July and now is the team's starting catcher.

Much of the team's best talent still resides in the minors.

"I would never tell anyone what they should do with their money," Vaughn said. "But for people to come out here and spend money, they want to see a good product. That doesn't mean with a good product, the product's going to win every game, but they should pay to see hustle.

"They don't want to see mistakes over and over again. They don't want to feel like they're watching the Bad News Bears. We're going to have to prove to them that we're going to be out there competing on a daily basis every single day."